1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a printing apparatus and color adjusting method, in which a desired color adjustment can easily be done of an input analog video signal before the signal is printed on a printing paper.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the conventional printer to print an input analog video signal on a printing paper, the user adjusts colors such as yellow (Y), magenta (M) and cyan (C) by printing the signal on the printing paper while displaying red (R), green (G) and blue (B) colors of the signal on a monitor.
Generally, many of the ordinary users have experiences with the subtractive mixture of colors in the adjustment of image colors. Thus, when adjusting additive process-based colors of an image being displayed on a video monitor for example, such a user can make no matching between the colors if he or she is not well familiar with the complementary relationship between the colors. Also since there exists a different in basic color appearance characteristic between the video monitor and print, it is difficult to accurately correlate color variations on the monitor with those in the print. Thus, in the conventional color matching, it is necessary to repeatedly adjust and print the colors until a user""s ideal hue is attained. Therefore, the conventional color matching consumes printing materials such as printing paper, ink ribbon, etc. very much. Also, it takes much time and great costs.
That is, the color matching with the conventional technique requires great costs (large consumption of printing paper, for example) and much time and in addition, needs knowledge of the colors. Therefore, the ordinary users cannot easily adjust image colors.
Accordingly, the present invention has an object to overcome the above-mentioned drawbacks of the prior art by providing a printer and color adjusting method, in which image colors can be adjusted easily, quickly and inexpensively.
The above object can be attained by providing a printer to print a video signal using printing media including a printing ink ribbon and paper, the printer including according to the present invention:
an image processing means for storing a plurality of data different from each other in a value on which the color appearance characteristic of the printing media depends and converting, using the plurality of data, an image composed of R, G and B video signals based on the video signal to a complementary-color image consisting of a desired number of frames; and
means for printing an output from the image processing means using the printing media.
Also the above object can be attained by providing a color adjusting method for use in a printer to print a video signal using printing media including a printing ink ribbon and paper, the method including, according to the present invention, steps of:
storing a plurality of data different from each other in a value on which the color appearance characteristic of the printing media depends and converting, using the video signal, an image composed of R, G and B video signals based on the video signal to a complementary-color image consisting of a desired number of frames;
printing an output from the image processing step using the printing media;
selecting a desired one of the plurality of images printed on the printing paper at the printing step; and
adjusting the colors according to the desired image selected at the selecting step.
More specifically, an important portion (for which color matching is to be done) on the monitor screen is designated and a plurality of images different in color balance from each other is printed out on one printing paper. Favorite ones are selected from the plurality of printed images and stored into the printer, thus permitting to easily realize a desired color matching.
According to the present invention, the color matching can be done by printing once instead of the conventional cut-and-try method (which takes much time and large costs). The color matching is possible without many prints (tens of prints as the case may be). Thus, it is possible to considerably cut the time and cost for the color matching.
Furthermore, according to the present invention, a desired color matching can easily be done without necessary knowledge for the color adjustment (yellow is a complementary color of blue, for example). Actually, a user""s sensation of a color will hardly result in a successful color matching. The simplicity of the color matching and reduction of time for the color matching owing to the present invention will greatly contribute to the operability of the printer.
These objects and other objects, features and advantages of the present intention will become more apparent from the following detailed description of the preferred embodiments of the present invention when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.